Some NDC supporters have gone as far as giving the President a 24-hour ultimatum to release Montie’s Mugabe and the other two panelists…

The Montie 3 jail sentence has continued to stir up controversies among citizens of Ghana. The recent development on the issue is that some supporters of the National Democratic Congress (NDC) who picketed at the party’s headquarters on Thursday, have begun demanding the release of the so called contemnors.

Using Mugabe as a point of contact, they have threatened to hold back their votes for Mahama come December, should the President turn deaf ears to their demand. The trio; host of Pampaso programme, Mugabe, and two panelists, Alistar Nelson and Godwin Ako Gun, were sentenced to four months in prison, after they were found guilty of contempt. They were cited in court following their threat on radio to kill Supreme Court judges over their handling of the suit on the credibility of the voters’ register.

The four-month jail sentence has however, not gone down well among many political stakeholders, who have described it as rather too harsh. Lawyers of the trio who described the sentence as “excessive and harsh”, had hinted at a possible petition to the President to intervene in the trio’s predicament with his prerogative of mercy.

The ruling NDC as well as its supporters, have massively condemned the 4-month jail term given to the contemnors. The party had released a statement yesterday saying that such harsh verdict by court,

sends an unfortunate impression about Ghana, its judiciary and severely dents our enviable reputation as a beacon of democracy on the African continent and beyond.

Following the party’s statement, the agitating supporters have called on President John Mahama to issue an executive order for the release of the three men, or risk losing their votes in the coming elections. Most of the supporters are of the opinion that if people can be jailed for campaigning for a party, then no one is safe. Moreover, they have gone as far as giving the President a 24-hour ultimatum to release Montie’s Mugabe and the two panelists.